Table of Contents

Evaluation of the Midtown Community Court in New York City, 1992-1994 (ICPSR 2311)

Principal Investigator(s):
Rottman, David, National Center for State Courts;
Ostrom, Brian, National Center for State Courts;
Sviridoff, Michele, National Center for State Courts;
Curtis, Richard, National Center for State Courts

Summary:

In October 1993, the Midtown Community Court opened as a
three-year demonstration project designed to forge links with the
community in developing a problem-solving approach to quality-of-life
offenses. The problems that this community-based courthouse sought to
address were specific to the court's midtown New York City location:
high concentration of quality-of-life crimes, broad community
dissatisfaction with court outcomes, visible signs of disorder, and
clusters of persistent high-rate offenders with serious problems,
including addiction and homelessness. This study was conducted to
evaluate how well the new court was able to dispense justice locally
and whether the establishment of the Midtown Community Court made a
difference in misdemeanor case processing. Data were collected at two
time periods for a comparative analysis. First, a baseline dataset
(Part 1, Baseline Data) was constructed from administrative records,
consisting of a ten-percent random sample of all nonfelony
arraignments in Manhattan during the 12 months prior to the opening of
the Midtown Community Court. Second, comparable administrative data
(Part 2, Comparison Data) were collected from all cases arraigned at
the Midtown Court during its first 12 months of operation, as well as
from a random sample of all downtown nonfelony arraignments held
during this same time period. Both files contain variables on precinct
of arrest, arraignment type, charges, bonds, dispositions, sentences,
total number of court appearances, and total number of warrants
issued, as well as prior felony and misdemeanor
convictions. Demographic variables include age, sex, and race of
offender.

In October 1993, the Midtown Community Court opened as a
three-year demonstration project designed to forge links with the
community in developing a problem-solving approach to quality-of-life
offenses. The problems that this community-based courthouse sought to
address were specific to the court's midtown New York City location:
high concentration of quality-of-life crimes, broad community
dissatisfaction with court outcomes, visible signs of disorder, and
clusters of persistent high-rate offenders with serious problems,
including addiction and homelessness. This study was conducted to
evaluate how well the new court was able to dispense justice locally
and whether the establishment of the Midtown Community Court made a
difference in misdemeanor case processing. Data were collected at two
time periods for a comparative analysis. First, a baseline dataset
(Part 1, Baseline Data) was constructed from administrative records,
consisting of a ten-percent random sample of all nonfelony
arraignments in Manhattan during the 12 months prior to the opening of
the Midtown Community Court. Second, comparable administrative data
(Part 2, Comparison Data) were collected from all cases arraigned at
the Midtown Court during its first 12 months of operation, as well as
from a random sample of all downtown nonfelony arraignments held
during this same time period. Both files contain variables on precinct
of arrest, arraignment type, charges, bonds, dispositions, sentences,
total number of court appearances, and total number of warrants
issued, as well as prior felony and misdemeanor
convictions. Demographic variables include age, sex, and race of
offender.

Access Notes

The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public.
Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.

Study Description

Citation

Rottman, David, Brian Ostrom, Michele Sviridoff, and Richard Curtis. Evaluation of the Midtown Community Court in New York City, 1992-1994. ICPSR02311-v1. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2000. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR02311.v1

Universe:
All nonfelony arraignments in Manhattan from October 1992
to September 1994.

Data Type(s):
administrative records data

Methodology

Study Purpose:
In October 1993, the Midtown Community Court
opened as a three-year demonstration project designed to forge links
with the community in developing a problem-solving approach to
quality-of-life offenses. The decision to establish the Midtown
Community Court grew out of a belief that the traditional court
response to low-level offenses was neither constructive nor meaningful
to victims, defendants, or the community. The problems that this
community-based courthouse sought to address were specific to the
court's midtown New York City location: high concentration of
quality-of-life crimes, broad community dissatisfaction with court
outcomes, visible signs of disorder, and clusters of persistent
high-rate offenders with serious problems, including addiction and
homelessness. This study was conducted to evaluate how well the new
court was able to dispense justice locally and whether the
establishment of the Midtown Community Court made a difference in
misdemeanor case processing.

Study Design:
This study was designed to compare case processing
and case outcomes between the Midtown Community Court and the downtown
court in light of six key decision points: (1) whether defendants
given a Desk Appearance Ticket showed up as scheduled, (2) whether the
case was disposed at arraignment or continued, (3) whether disposition
was through dismissal, adjournment in contemplation of dismissal, or
conviction, (4) whether the sentence involved an alternative sanction,
traditional sentence, or no sanction, (5) whether jail sentences were
imposed, and (6) whether sentenced offenders complied with alternative
sanctions. Data were collected at two time periods for a comparative
analysis. First, a baseline dataset (Part 1, Baseline Data) was
constructed from administrative records, consisting of a ten-percent
random sample of all nonfelony arraignments in Manhattan during the 12
months prior to the opening of the Midtown Community Court. Second,
comparable administrative data (Part 2, Comparison Data) were
collected from all cases arraigned at the Midtown Court during its
first 12 months of operation, as well as from a random sample of all
downtown nonfelony arraignments held during this same time period.

Sample:
Random sampling.

Data Source:

The Criminal Justice Agency, New York City and the
Department of Criminal Justice Service

Description of Variables:
Both files contain variables on precinct of arrest,
arraignment type, charges, bonds, dispositions, sentences, total
number of court appearances, and total number of warrants issued, as
well as prior felony and misdemeanor convictions. Demographic
variables include age, sex, and race of offender.

Response Rates:
Not applicable.

Presence of Common Scales:
None.

Extent of Processing: ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of
disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major
statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to
these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

Performed recodes and/or calculated derived variables.

Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.

Version(s)

Original ICPSR Release: 2000-04-18

Version History:

2006-03-30 File CB2311.ALL.PDF was removed from any previous datasets and flagged as a study-level file, so that it will accompany all downloads.

2005-11-04 On 2005-03-14 new files were added to one
or more datasets. These files included additional setup files as well
as one or more of the following: SAS program, SAS transport, SPSS portable,
and Stata system files. The metadata record was revised 2005-11-04 to
reflect these additions.

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